I was going to write a post about Kool-Aid drinkers when the following posts appeared on LutherQuest (sic):
Dianne Dexter (Searching)
Member
Username: Searching
Post Number: 158
Registered: 1-2005
Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2008 - 2:25 pm:
-------------------------------
Jonathan,
Isn't that what the CLC (Church of the Lutheran Confession) did? The ones that formed the CLC had the will...and they organized out of the 3 above-mentioned synods. Politics and power are absent in the CLC...except the power of the Word of God.
(Just my thoughts when I read your last sentence.)
^^^^
Rev. Stephen Kurtzahn (Hville79)
New member
Username: Hville79
Post Number: 13
Registered: 6-2008
Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2008 - 3:44 pm:
----------------------------------
Dianne:
I'm a rather new poster on LutherQuest. I am a pastor who colloquized into the WELS in 2002 from the CLC, the Church of the Lutheran Confession. I was in the CLC for 27 years (after being raised mostly in the WELS and attending WELS synodical schools) and a pastor in the CLC for 23. I served on several boards and committees, including the Board of Doctrine. I also served as Conference Visitor (like a circuit pastor in the WELS but for a larger geographic area). I can tell you from personal experience and observation that politics and power are just as present in the CLC as it may be in the WELS, the ELS or the LC-MS. That's because these are all human organizations made up of sinful human beings.
Yes, as a WELS pastor I would have a problem with one of my members participating in the Lord's Supper at a non-WELS, non-ELS church.
Jonathan:
The basic premise is not flawed. Scripture teaches there should be complete unity in the teachings and practices of Scripture for there to be any expression of fellowship. 1 Cor. 1:10 comes to mind as just one of many passages. The WELS has defined this as the Unit Concept of Fellowship. In our imperfect world, the best way to express this unity and oneness is through our church and synod membership. To say "There is a stream of unity in doctrine and practice between the three synods that is ignored and marginalized in the name of politics and power" is simply an unwise statement to make. If there are people in the LCMS or the CLC that believe all the same things I do, that would be wonderful. Our unity is found in the Holy Christian Church! But as long as such people subscribe their names to a denomination that clearly teaches false doctrine or officially is legalistic, then I dare not give the impression there is unity when there is not. To express unity in such situations would be to trivialize error, whether the error be in a doctrinal formulation or in a legalistic practice or in an un-evangelical emphasis. I don't think any confessional Lutheran would want to trivialize error.
^^^^
Jonathan Townsend (Jtownsend)
Intermediate Member
Username: Jtownsend
Post Number: 299
Registered: 1-2005
Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2008 - 6:10 pm:
----------------------------------------------------
Pastor Kurtzahn:
Three years ago I moved. I left the most confessional LCMS Lutheran congregation I was ever a member of, Emmanuel Dearborn, for an equally confessional WELS congregation St. Peter's in Plymouth. There are two basic differences: I have a different pastor, and the synod is different. In doctrine and practice both are unabashedly UAC Lutheran. There is no trivialization here. There is either UAC Lutheran or not. That should be the standard for fellowship.
I think Luther and Chemnitz would be ashamed of us for the current division.
------------------------------------------------------
Feld Unbekannt
^^^^
Rev. Stephen Kurtzahn (Hville79)
New member
Username: Hville79
Post Number: 14
Registered: 6-2008
Posted on Saturday, August 02, 2008 - 7:29 pm:
--------------------------------------------------
Jonathan:
Not only wold (sic) Luther and Chemnitz be ashamed, but I know the Lord himself would be ashamed of us for many things. Praise God we are covered in Christ's righteousness!
That being said, if Emmanuel, Dearborn is unabashedly UAC Lutheran, why does it stay in a synod that has officially strayed from the Word in so many different areas in both its doctrine as well as its practice?
***
GJ - Wait until the cyber-minders of WELS find out Kurtzahn is posting on LQ (sic). I am sure that is a breech of fellowship. Too bad the LQ (sic) site does not have a spell checker or a doctrine checker. If those tools were installed, there would be precious few posts.
Recently Jack Cascione (former ELS colloquy reject) stated that the Gospel required the Voters' Assembly to be effective. Even the normally docile Rolf Preus opined that Jack needed a longer vacation. Coming from Preus, a man who thinks everyone in the world is already forgiven, without faith or the Means of Grace, that is pretty severe. Will Jack join the Rolf Synod? Will Rolf join the Cascione Synod?
Dianne Dexter, having finished a quart of CLC (sic) Kool Aid, is certain she has found a synod without politics, without a zephyr of false doctrine. Their missionary-force-of-one, David Koenig, praises Roman and Reformed doctrine while denouncing Lutheran doctrine. His buddy, Paul Tiefel, joins him in this farce. That nano-sect is consistently opposed to the Confessions, but they claim otherwise.
This is really funny--> When I claimed Valleskey went to Fuller, Koenig contacted Valleskey to see if it was true. Valleskey confessed, and did not deny, but confessed that he did go to Fuller. (Remember that Valleskey called me a liar six ways from Sunday for saying he did go there.) Next Koenig wrote me that Valleskey was angry with him for telling me the truth, which I publicized for the good of Valleskey's soul. So Koenig was angry with me for telling the truth and naming him as the source. Poor David was also in close contact with Larry Olson (DMin, Fuller). The Church Growth fellowship is far more true and loyal and united than any synodical ties. Meanwhile, buddy Paul Tiefel was working with his first cousin James Tiefel.
All these sects are really Pietistic movements with some hints of Lutheranism in them. That is why some of the apostate ministers end up as honest Baptists or Pentecostals, others as honest Romanists or EO priests.
The trouble is, the Lutheran sects in America no longer have any doctrinal leadership. They have Kool Aid drinkers who constantly apologize for all their doctrinal errors or silence everyone with "I am fat and dumb," (to quote a WELS circuit pastor.)
I post Episcopal news because they have leaders who are visibly and audibly fighting error in their own denomination. I have no interest in promoting their latitudinarianism. Lutherans today do not have enough fight to knock the skin off a pudding.
PS - Rev. Jim Jones was a Marxist bi-sexual minister of the Disciples of Christ, the same denomination as Donald McGavran. The Disciples had a discipline committee (ironic name) that did nothing about the well known abuses of Jones, long before the tragic massacre.
